The position of the Spanish government has always shown absolute cynicism regarding the right of the Saharawi people to self-determination. However, Spain's proposal to hand over the freedom of a people to the oppressor who has been exercising systematic violence against them is an inexplicable and despicable turn that we strongly condemn.
The geostrategic or economic justifications used to justify this change in policy cannot override the resolutions of the United Nations and the International Courts on respect for human rights in occupied Sahara and on the right to self-determination and independence.
The Spanish state cannot validate the murders, tortures, rapes and persecutions perpetrated by the Moroccan government and suffered by thousands of Saharawi people. Such acts would make this country an accomplice to crimes against humanity and the exile of an entire people for almost 50 years. The Sahara conflict is the second oldest in the United Nations, after that of the Palestinian people.
There can be no compensation for connivance with murderers and torturers. Neighborhood policies cannot be based on blackmail. We cannot turn someone who does not guarantee human rights into the guarantor of our borders. The externalization of our borders brings us closer to the increasingly barbaric global inequality and the loss of standards in the protection of human rights.
The working class in the Spanish state is overwhelmingly and clamorously in favor of the Saharawi position. Not only in the polls, years of solidarity and ties of friendship reinforce a special relationship between our peoples. Thus, this government not only betrays the Saharawis, but also its own citizens.
We consider that the government's position is unacceptable, it is a moral obligation to defend the right of the Saharawi people and demand that Spain take responsibility as a decolonizing power in Western Sahara, as recognized by the United Nations.
Likewise, we support and will continue all pressure actions so that the Spanish state complies with international law, the resolutions of the United Nations and the commitments of self-determination of Western Sahara.
The main demand of the Saharawi people is to exist, something denied by the Moroccan dictatorship. It is theirs, in short, a struggle for life and dignity.
Free Sahara
Manuel Plasencia, Member of the Canal Gestión works council representing the General Confederation of Labor (CGT).